How the LG G5's dual camera compares to the best smartphone camera in the world

The hottest spot for innovation in smartphone design right now is the camera on the back. These devices have leaped from grainy, awkward replacements for disposable cameras to photo gear to be taken as seriously as any Nikon product.

Whenever a new contender hit shelves we like to compare it to the reigning best smartphone you can buy. Right now that's the Samsung Galaxy S7, which wildly outperformed the previous leader, the iPhone 6s Plus, in our test.

Here's how the LG G5's innovative new dual-camera system stands up to the Galaxy S7:

The G5's main camera and the S7 produce images of good look and feel in easy conditions.

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In the even light of the Flatiron District at noon on a cloudy day, these phones produce very similar images in terms of color and exposure.

I leave the cameras in "Auto" mode for these tests, because that's how most people, including the pro photographers I know, work with smartphones. It's up to the phone's silicon brain to expose the image properly, and both devices get it basically right in these conditions. That wasn't a sure thing — LG's last premium phone, the V10, tended to oversaturate daylight images.

One thing I do prefer about the S7's shot here? The aspect ratio. LG likes to give its smartphone camera sensors ultra-wide 17:9 aspect ratios. That's too wide for my taste, cutting off vertical context in a lot of situations and using the lens less efficiently.

Blown up to full size, you can see that the S7 is the sharper camera.

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Again proving that bingeing on megapixels is a bad idea for smartphone developers, the 12.1 MP S7 makes a sharper image than the 16 MP G5 here. In fact, the G5's shot hardly even blows up any bigger than the S7's because those 16 megapixels are spread so inefficiently across an ultra-wide sensor.

The G5's lens isn't soft by any means, but it can't match the S7. Look at those bricks on the S7 shot. On the S7 they pop, but on the G5 not so much.

Strangely, it looks like the G5 is even softer than the quite-sharp V10 was in our comparison. However, that was in different lighting conditions at I don't have a V10 to test it against head to head with.

The LG G5 has a second, ultra-wide rear camera.

I took the above video in the G5's picture-in-picture mode, which lets you simultaneously shoot from both cameras at once. While I've argued going ultra-wide as opposed to more zoomed in was a waste of a good idea by LG, it's good to see an attempt at innovation, and the eight megapixel, f/2.4 camera isn't bad in any obvious way. It's just hard to find a good use-case for it.

The G5's autofocus isn't great.

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I brought both cameras within a few inches of this flower waving in the wind and tapped the inner, projected-forward petals on the screen. The S7, with its ultra-fast autofocus, easily got the shot. No matter how many times I tried though, the G5 back-focused either to the rear petals or the building behind them.

Dynamic range and color are pretty good, but again the G5 can't beat the S7.

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Both the G5 and the S7 are Android phones, which means in mixed light they tend to go for bright exposures and colors will look more saturated than on iOS devices. You can see that in how both of them handled this display of shoes. However, there are differences. The G5's shot artificially brightened the color of that pink shoe on the left, fading the color in the process.

The G5's sensor also appears to show a somewhat weaker dynamic range here. Look at the white bits on the yellow shoe and the shoe all the way to the right. On the S7, you can see color detail in the highlights. The G5 clips those highlights off though, making them look all white.

The biggest difference between the Samsung Galaxy S7 and LG G5 was how they performed in low light.

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The S7 has the best low-light smartphone camera in the world, with its superb f/1.7 aperture lens. I thought the G5 might have a chance here though. Its lens comes close on specs with an f/1.8 aperture (in aperture, lower is better). But, as you can see from the shot above, there isn't any contest.

The S7's nighttime shot is bright and detailed, and the colors, while imperfect, are pretty good. When I tried the same shot on the G5 it entirely failed to focus on two attempts before producing the dark, discolored image above.

Here's a close up.

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As you can see here, this is more than S7 software artificially brightening an image. The G5's sensor lost a lot of low light detail to the murk, while the S7 picked it up beautifully.